ROSTOV-ON-DON, October 16 (RIA Novosti) - A district military court in the North Caucasus sentenced on Friday a Russian sergeant major to ten years in prison on charges of spying for Georgia.

The court ruled that Dzhemal Nakaidze had collected state secrets and handed them over to Georgian special services for financial reward from February through November 2008.

Nakaidze will be stripped of his military rank and will serve his sentence at a maximum security penal colony.

The judge said Nakaidze had pleaded guilty.

Although public prosecutors had insisted that Nakaidze be sentenced to 12 years six months, they said they were satisfied with the punishment.

"We will not contest the judgment," public prosecutor Igor Blizeyev told reporters.

"All that moved him was greed. When cooperating with Georgian special services he was repeatedly given monetary rewards," Blizeyev said.

Long-standing tensions between Russia and former Soviet republic Georgia turned violent in August 2008 when Georgian forces attacked South Ossetia in an attempt to bring it back under central control. Most residents of the former Georgian republic had had Russian citizenship for many years.

Two weeks after the end of the five-day war, Russia recognized South Ossetia, and another former Georgian republic, Abkhazia, as independent states.